Notre Dame women's basketball: Peters pushes past adversities

December 26, 2009|By AL LESAR Tribune Staff Writer

SOUTH BEND -- One hundred and nineteen minutes into her first practice in more than a year, Devereaux Peters was still able to smile. For coach Muffet McGraw, that was a good sign. Peters, a 6-foot-2 junior on Notre Dame's women's basketball team, hasn't had many reasons to smile over the last three seasons. It used to be a way to camouflage the pain and frustration. But now, the ear-to-ear grin is genuine. Peters came to the Irish from Fenwick High in Chicago as one of the nation's top recruits. Athletic inside presence. Ran the court well. Amazing shot-blocker. Strong rebounder. Could score when necessary. Quite an upside. That upside got turned upside-down 23 games into Peters' freshman season (2007-08). Never having had a serious injury before, Peters went down with a torn anterior cruciate ligament in her left knee. Daunting, but not devastating. Peters dutifully did the rehab work. Surgery repaired the damage. Strength returned. Life goes on, as did her sophomore year. Three games into last season, the unthinkable happened. Same injury. Same knee. “Initially, that's the hardest part,” McGraw said of Peters' emotional state. “‘Oh, not again!' Outside of that initial part, I thought she handled (the recovery process) beautifully.” “Right away, the doctors told me, ‘You'll play again,'” Peters said. “That made me feel better. The tough part was going through the rehab again.” The rehab was more difficult the second time around. The injury happened near Thanksgiving last year. The first of two surgeries was in February. The second was in May. Peters finally got clearance for full participation last week. “We want a nice, gradual comeback,” McGraw said. “It will be completely up to her in terms of how things are going.” She hasn't seen game action yet. Maybe Tuesday at Central Florida. Maybe Thursday at home against Vanderbilt. “I told everybody in the locker room (before that first practice) I was going to have to knock the dust off my ankle braces,” Peters said, flashing the smile without hesitation. A big, heavy brace now stabilizes her left knee. Probably will for the rest of her career. She runs a bit stiff, but still runs pretty well. Peters doesn't shy away from contact and, in a fit of frustration, punished the padded basket standard with a hard kick - with her left leg - for missing a free throw and forcing her teammates to run sprints. “I'm sort of a perfectionist,” Peters said. “I haven't been able to do things that I took for granted before. Moving (on the floor) isn't natural, like it used to be. It felt weird. My mind wanted to do things, but my body wouldn't cooperate.” No way to get around that. A year off the floor is going to take its toll. McGraw sees the signs of the old Devereaux Peters, and isn't worried about that great player making a return. “You can already see what she can add in her shot-blocking and rebounding,” McGraw said of Peters, whose long arms give her a 77-inch wingspan. “Those are things we're missing.” Is she the missing piece of what could be a special puzzle this season? Call her the “X” factor. Peters leaned on Irish assistant Niele Ivey, who as a point guard was a key ingredient in ND's 2001 national championship run, during the tough times. Ivey, likewise, went through two ACL surgeries during her time at Notre Dame. “Niele was always there for me,” Peters said. “She talked about how everything happens for a reason. If she wouldn't have gotten hurt, she wouldn't have been there for a fifth year to win a national championship.” This situation has forced Peters to adjust her perspective on life and basketball. “Sitting back and watching things happen, I've seen how one player's frustration on the floor affects everybody else,” Peters said. “I never realized how my being upset would impact the whole team. But I saw it from a distance. “I learned not to look at things in the long term. I look at it in the short term: ‘What am I going to get done today?' If you look at it in the larger span of things, it can be overwhelming. You just have to push through it.” And, somehow, keep smiling.